


The Last Stand

by jazzonia



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Battle of Hogwarts, Book 7: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Family, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-07-21
Updated: 2007-07-21
Packaged: 2018-01-03 09:36:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,037
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1068908
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jazzonia/pseuds/jazzonia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An alternate version of the moment during the final battle when Harry comes face-to-face with his parents, Remus, and Sirius.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Last Stand

"Lily," asked James one day, "what do you see?"

"A playground," she answered, "with a swing-set and sandboxes and the whole lot. There's a forest over to the left, and my house is down the road behind us."

James nodded in pensive silence, his arm draped around his wife's shoulders.

"What is this place, to you?" she asked after a while.

"My home," he answered with a dreamy smile. "Down by the lake shore, with the woods to the right and the house up the hill over there." He pointed at what was, to Lily, the slide; she hummed in comprehension.

It was a long time before Lily spoke up again. "Why do you think we're here?"

"I don't rightly know," James answered with a shrug. Lily blinked, unsurprised, and nestled further into his touch.

They had spent a very long time in this place, and the lack of stimulation had taken its toll on the couple. Nothing seemed as real as it once was, though neither noticed; hunger and thirst were no longer, and no touch was as it used to be. Memories, too, were mere ghosts of another time, things that resurfaced every so often. Both of them thought of Harry, whenever they thought about their past selves at all; James thought of the Marauders sometimes, and Lily, of Severus. It was almost an unconscious thing, remembering, something that just _occurred_. They did not speak of it, having forgotten about their recollection the moment it passed.

But, at some point -- days and weeks and years bore little relevance in this place -- something changed.

"James!" shouted Lily, stirring quite suddenly from where she lay beside him.

"I know!" he replied, for he, too, felt the curious urge to stand and race toward the trees. His forest and Lily's had not been in the same place, but now their worlds were perfectly aligned.

"It's..." Lily struggled to find the word. Then, as a scruffy-haired boy somewhere far away turned an ancient stone for the second time, both whispered the word they had been searching for all of these years.

" _Harry_."

They stood with linked hands, and approached the place that they were drawn to. And as their son turned the stone the third time, James and Lily were pulled, quite literally, out of their worlds.

For sixteen years, neither remembered ever knowing what it was like to feel dirt under their feet or breathe in the scent of grass or taste fear in their mouths; but these things came to them in an instant, in an overload of senses that neither was prepared for. James kissed Lily soundly once they had recovered themselves, before both turned to face the man who had to be their son.

Lily approached him and said, "You've been so brave." Because she knew what he had done, and what he had to live through, and how difficult it was for him; only a mother could _know_ all of that, and she did.

"You are nearly there. Very close. We are ... so proud of you," James managed to choke out. He saw with unbelievable clarity what his son had to -- and would -- do, with valor and confidence and honor. Lily smiled at her husband, and they both thought the same thing: he truly was a Potter, and an Evans, and a Marauder. He was their son.

"Does it hurt?" Harry asked, a child again for the moment.

"Dying?" And there was Sirius, James's brother-who-wasn't, there in all his young glory. "Not at all. Quicker and easier than falling asleep." He and James exchanged glances, remembering those long nights at Hogwarts when nightmares about their pasts and futures would keep the two boys awake at night. Death, Sirius figured, was very blissful in comparison.

"And he will want it to be quick," Remus added, his face boyish and nearly unscarred once more. "He wants it over." _Ever practical,_ Sirius reflected with a smile. _That's my Moony._

"I didn't want you to die. Any of you. I'm sorry -- " but Harry was cut off by Remus, who so rarely interrupted, who spoke of regrets and things not finished. Sirius didn't hear a word of it, but focused instead on the sweet curve of Moony's mouth that he had missed so dearly.

"You'll stay with me?" Harry asked after a moment, and Lily nodded vigorously.

"Until the very end," James assured him, knowing quite suddenly that this was the reason why they had stayed in that place for so long -- they had a son to raise, _until the very end_.

"They won't be able to see you?" asked Harry, and all four of them knew the answer as as Sirius spoke it.

"We are part of you, invisible to anyone else." All of them, regardless of blood, were a part of Harry now. They were silent for a moment, gazing upon the boy that they loved so dearly.

"Stay close to me," Harry whispered to Lily. She gave him an encouraging smile, its warmth reflected in the twin eyes gazing back at her.

And Harry set off, his stride exuding the authority of a man twice his age. The four friends hurried after him, using whatever they could to protect Harry. Lily and James focused the pent-up energy of sixteen years' isolation from the earth; Sirius channeled his regret at time wasted; and Remus fought valiantly to stop history from being repeated to save his son.

Finally the time came when they laid eyes upon Voldemort. James and Lily last saw him as a wizard at the height of power, seconds from his demise; Sirius scoffed at a cowardly being hiding behind his servants; and Remus shook his head at the desperate excuse for a man overseeing a massacre from afar. All four hated him with quite the same passion.

It was as shocking to the ghost-beings to hear Voldemort admit error as it was to his followers; but even more surprising was Harry's voice, clear and cool, as it frightened the Dark Lord like he had never been before.

It was the image of Harry silhouetted by flames, standing confidently before Voldemort, that allowed the four friends to move on to the heaven that they deserved.


End file.
